Chapter 9
Gaze
AT THE END of the week, Ms. Stone would be home. Which was good. Because I knew Pixie was having a rough time trying to keep the lights off at night. I even kept one of my lamps on and pointed it into her room to try to help.
I wasn’t afraid of the dark. I was becoming afraid of my father. He’d hit me before, but never like this. The bar was too close. Too expected. And I think he was getting into other things besides alcohol. And with his personality, it wasn’t good.
I popped my head through my window, looking for Pixie. She twirled into view, dancing to her music. She made joy in my heart. Like she was building a snowman in there with her smiles and laughter as the snow.
“Hey.” I watched as she stopped. She wasn’t self-conscious, just curious what I had to say. “You ready for your mom?”
“Oh yeah. I’m going to bake cookies and make sure the place looks clean.” She leaned out and looked for Fat Asshole.
Fat Asshole was the pigeon that had taken to hanging out near our windows. Mostly, he stayed out of the way, but he plucked food out of both Pixie’s and my hands. Hence the nickname.
He was there, but he was acting differently. Funny. Almost limping along the edge of the cement detail that the wood plank leaned on.
“He’s hurt.” Pixie’s eyebrows knitted together.
“Looks like it’s just his foot. Luckily, he has wings. He’ll be fine. And maybe so will our food in the future.” I wanted to play ball for a few, but Pixie’s attention was solidly on the bird.
“No. I can see it. He has a twist tie on his leg. It looks like someone put it on him.” Pixie frowned.
Crap. I hated to see her frown. “Want me to hit him with the ball and see if it will knock off?”
“No! Oh my God, no. You’ll knock him unconscious. Poor thing. The other pigeons will beat him up. They’re vicious.”
She started to climb out onto her windowsill.
“Okay, hold up.” I wasn’t sure what I was going to do, but she was scaring me a little.
Fat Asshole hopped off the ledge and flop/flew to the center of the plank. Pixie was actually right. The bird was screwed up. I looked at her face. I didn’t want to have her watch something die right in front of her. Even if it was a jerk.
I was small, but I had great balance. “Sporty little thing,” my dad would comment from time to time when I made a good catch or whatever.
After putting my butt on my sill, I swung my legs over and placed them on the wood. “Listen, go get some bread or something and keep his attention.”
I was still holding my weight mostly on my arms. The plank felt pretty steady. There was no wind. A still day, which was probably working against Fat Asshole. He had no currents to coast on.
Pixie was back in the window. She had the tie from a pink robe and a slice of white bread. “I feel like this is stupid.” She was doing the calculations in her head. It didn’t make sense, but I wanted to be a hero for her, a little.
“Just keep him looking at you. That’s all I need.” I eased my weight from the sill to the plank. It held. I inched out a bit, the depth of the height somehow soaring into my stomach and chilling the top of my spine. She was right. This was stupid. I decided not to look down again. I went slowly to my knees, only bouncing Asshole a tiny bit. Pixie tossed out a bit of bread close to the bird. He was a greedy little bastard, so he started peck-eating, even though he was all twisted up. I began crawling out. I heard Pixie inhale sharply. It was scaring her. I was scaring her. My adrenaline became a livewire. I was hyperfocused. I looked down and got woozy.
“Just go back. Forget this bird. I’ll knock him off myself.” Her voice was high and squeaky.
“I don’t think I can.” I tried to slow my heartbeat. There was only forward.
“Okay. Okay, I’ll call the police. Or the firehouse. Just stay still.” Pixie disappeared from her window.
“Wait! Wait! Pix, wait.” I glanced up, and she appeared. “Your mom. We can’t let them find out she leaves you for so long. I think it’s illegal.”
She bit her bottom lip and then shook her head, “No. it doesn’t matter. I don’t want you to fall.”
I lied for the first time to Pixie Rae. “This board is getting weak. I need to get over there now.”
It wasn’t weak. It felt strong still, but as I inched out more, it did seem to bow a touch. “Just keep feeding Asshole.”
Pixie was hesitant, but did as I asked. The bird hobble-hopped closer to the bread she was throwing. Luckily, she had a good arm and good aim. I didn’t tell her if she missed her shot Asshole would be dumb enough to plummet to his pancake form in the alley below trying to get the food.
I inched closer. I took a look at his leg. The twist tie was confusing. It was hooked to his other leg and had a claw pinched in it. Someone tried to tie him up. And all they would have to do was feed him, because I was now inches away from him and he was oblivious. He didn’t even have the common sense to be afraid of me, even though someone had recently messed with him.
I carefully pushed myself up to a crouch. I took a deep breath and snatched up Asshole. Then he freaked out. I wasn’t counting on him fighting as hard as he did. I ducked my head and shoulders trying to avoid his pecking beak. He started nailing me in the fingers. I clamped one hand on his mouth and kept the other around his neck.
As I shuffled, the plank lifted up on one side. With all the motion, the plank was wobbling and I was having trouble finding my center of balance. All of a sudden the plank steadied. Pixie was on the plank with me, using her weight to stop the plank from moving any further.
“Thanks.” I was heaving my breath. Asshole was living up to his name. I was not going to be able to get the twist tie off while essentially on a balance beam. I locked eyes with Pixie who looked petrified. She was gripping the inside of the window, her feet planted on the plank. “Duck.”
She looked confused for a second. “That’s a pigeon. Oh. Wait, you want me to duck.” She leaned forward, leaving a small clearing for a bird to fit through.
I whipped Asshole like a baseball right through Pixie’s window.
“Oh!” Pixie stood back up as Asshole bounced off her back and fluttered back into the room. The movement it took to throw the bird sent me off-kilter again. My only instinct was to run. I hopped as fast as I could, doing my best to maintain my balance with my momentum.
When I finally got to Pixie’s end of the plank, I gripped the sill behind her. We were lip to lip in our very first kiss, heart pounding before either of us even knew what was happening.
It lasted longer than it should because we were both focused on keeping our balance. When I finally pulled back, our feet were solid and the bird was shrieking. I peeked around Pixie’s shoulder, and Asshole was freaking out in her room.
The motion set the plank off balance again. I could feel the edge dropping away from my window’s ledge. We were going down. It was over.
Chapter 10
Pixie Rae
I SAW THE plank tipping and felt my axis tilting. I wrapped my arms around Gaze and leaned back as far as I could, tucking my legs up around him. We tumbled together backward into my room. My hip hit the floor first, absorbing both of our weight. The resounding clatter of the plank hitting the alley below echoed in the room.